A pulse of hope in the Colorado River delta

Bi-national effort to revive endangered Mexican wetlands

At the Laguna Grande restoration site, Pronatura Noroeste staff members Osvel Hinojosa, front, and Juan Jose Butron look toward a bird. In the background is Javier Rivera, an engineer with the Autonomous University of Baja California who is measuring the water's flow.

At the Laguna Grande restoration site, Pronatura Noroeste staff members Osvel Hinojosa, front, and Juan Jose Butron look toward a bird. In the background is Javier Rivera, an engineer with the Autonomous University of Baja California who is measuring the water's flow.

LAGUNA GRANDE, Baja California  Something remarkable has been happening in recent days in this thirsty desert region south of the U.S. border: The Colorado River once again has been connecting to the sea.

This is no act of nature. The flow has been the result of years of planning and high-level negotiations between the United States and Mexico under a landmark agreement known as Minute 319.

The river’s once mighty current is now not much more than a trickle by the time it reaches the Gulf of California more than 90 miles downstream from Algodones on the Arizona border. Yet that there is any connection at all has been something to celebrate, building hopes for restoring the few surviving wetlands at the river’s southern end in the Mexican delta.

“That’s what’s fascinating, the willingness of nature to come back,” said Osvel Hinojosa, a wildlife biologist with Pronatura Noroeste, a branch of Mexico’s oldest and largest environmental organization.

A large water delivery to the delta in recent weeks is part of a five-year bi-national pilot project, and its supporters have an oft-repeated mantra: A little bit a water goes a long way. They hope their efforts will not only restore a biologically important region, but offer lessons for other arid areas.

Timed for the delta’s peak germination season, the eight-week “pulse flow” was launched on March 23 and concluded Sunday. It is being supplemented by a lower-volume and longer-term base flow.

An aerial photo looking south, with the Colorado River in the forefront as it connects to the Gulf of California, in the background.
— Francisco Zamora, Sonoran Institute and LightHawk

An aerial photo looking south, with the Colorado River in the forefront as it connects to the Gulf of California, in the background.
/ Francisco Zamora, Sonoran Institute and LightHawk

Hinojosa said he has seen greater numbers of migratory birds in more parts of the delta in recent weeks. Tiny shoots of cottonwood and willows are emerging on the river’s banks, and irrigation water is gushing down trenches of planted trees to be used in restoration projects. Perhaps the most important result, Hinojosa said, has been the renewal of a connection to the river among residents of Baja California’s Mexicali Valley and nearby Sonora.

“People like to see a river with life,” said Javier Mosqueda, a lifelong delta resident, who owns a tourist camp near river’s mouth on the Rio Hardy. “It’s been a titanic effort. … We were able to get the U.S. and Mexican governments to sit down and pay attention to the delta.”

In Mexico Osvel Hinojosa, below, and Jose Juan Butron tour a section of the Colorado River Delta that was dry prior to the "Pulse Flow" water release at 30 miles north at Morelos Dam.
— Charlie Neuman / UT San Diego

A water dept.worker cleans debris from an agriculture irrigation channel gate carrying water from the Colorado River. He says the gates need to cleaned every few months to keep the water flowing smoothly.
— Charlie Neuman / UT San Diego

Jose Juan Butron, left, and his father Juan Butron Mendez, of the Pronatura Noroeste environmental group, prepare to remove their boat from this now flowing section of the river delta.
— Charlie Neuman / UT San Diego

Juan Butron Mendez washes the dust from his face in a section of the river delta area that was dry prior to the "pulse flow" water release. At left is Mexico and at right is the United States.
— Charlie Neuman / UT San Diego

Osvel Hinojosa, takes photos as he stands in a section of the river that was dry prior to the recent "Pulse Flow" water release. At left is Mexico and at right is the United States.
— Charlie Neuman / UT San Diego

The Colorado River supplies users on both sides of the border, and in recent years has on average accounted for 63 percent of San Diego’s water supply. As growing populations upstream in the United States and Mexico have put new demands on the river in recent decades, the delta’s few remaining natural areas have been getting less and less water. Compounding the problem is the basin’s historic 14-year drought. The water hasn't flowed steadily here since the 1960s, and the last time the river connected to the upper Gulf of California was 1998.

But Minute 319, signed in November 2012 and backed by the U.S. and Mexican federal governments and the seven U.S. basin states, has aimed to change that. Negotiated through the U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission and its Mexican counterpart, CILA, the talks involved the active participation of environmental groups: Pronatura and two U.S. organizations, Sonoran Institute and the Environmental Defense Fund.